Sweetest in the gale

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul,

And sings the tune without words,

And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;

And sore must be the storm

That could abash the little bird

That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chilliest land,

And on the strangest sea;

Yet, never, in extremity,

It asked a crumb of me.

                                                                            -- Emily Dickinson